Related Links

Yohangza: "A Midsummer Night's Dream"

Shakespeare on the Global Stage

Saturday, April 23, 2016 - 7:00pm

Diana Chapman Walsh Alumnae Hall Auditorium (201)

The Shakespeare on the Global Stage festival celebrates the global reach of Shakespeare on the 400th anniversary of his death. The Festival will feature talks by eminent scholars from around the world that will highlight the on-going and volatile evolution of Shakespeare from the original Globe stage to the global stage, and a performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream by Yohangza, an internationally acclaimed theatre troupe from Seoul, South Korea. The festival will begin on April 23 at 4:15 PM with the Keynote Lecture, followed by the Yohanza performance at 7:00 PM and will continue a few days later with Stephen Greenblatt's lecture on April 27 at 7:00 PM. Please see the related links for more information about each event.

“Wonderfully wicked and magical” (The Scotsman) Through brilliantly choreographed dance, mimes, songs and contemporized traditional Korean music, a cast of 13 create an unforgettable production for the whole family. Join us for a performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream by Yohangza, an internationally acclaimed theatre troupe from Seoul, South Korea, as part of Shakespeare on the Global Stage: A Festival of Performance and Scholarship, which celebrates the global reach of Shakespeare on the 400th anniversary of his death. The performance will be in Korean, with English subtitles.

Yohangza is a South Korean theatre company founded in 1997 by director/writer Yang Jung-Ung. The company is renowned for its exhilarating adaptations of Western classics in a unique theatrical idiom that combines traditional Korean practices with a global and modern sensibility. As a Telegraph reviewer explained, "it has been infused with themes from the country’s culture and folklore…And, in Korean, this play—perhaps all too familiar to me in English—seemed suddenly like an entirely new work."

Yohangza means voyager, and this groundbreaking company has travelled all over the world since its inception in 1997. The company has been invited to various Shakespeare festivals and world arts centers in Australia, Cuba, Germany, Poland, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taipei and the UK.

Presented by the Susan and Donald Newhouse Center, and generously funded by the Moffet Fund (Medieval-Renaissance Studies), the Marjorie Coplan Baum Memorial Fund, the Treves Fund, Arts Council Korea, English Department, Office of the Provost, The Korea Foundation, Wellesley College Theatre and Wellesley Repertory Theatre, East Asian Languages and Cultures, East Asian Studies, The Mayling Soong Foundation, The Partnership for Diversity and Inclusion, and with additional support from the Korean Student Association, Asian Student Union, and Shakespeare Society.